Columnist Jon Fine graciously referred to newspapers as "cockroaches" that have survived "decades of doomsayers." He concludes that the Internet may be the fatal Black Flag.

I've never thought of myself as a cockroach. I suppose it's a compliment to be dubbed a survivor. But we want to be more than that in the media world emerging, and editors like me are growing weary of the negative articles and premature notices of our demise.

The truth is most editors these days don't think of themselves as strictly newspaper editors. I am the editor of the Wisconsin State Journal, which publishes on presses and on the Internet. The future of news depends on this, and today I need your help charting a new course.

Recent studies show that newspaper content is reaching more people. The ink-and-paper newspaper reaches 60 percent of adults on an average Sunday, and in Madison, a recent survey indicates it could be as high as 82 percent of Dane County adults. The audience for our Web portal, madison.com, has grown fast, reaching 42 percent of Dane County adults.

Most newspaper companies are earning healthy profits and moving fast to innovate Web products.

At the same time, excellent journalism thrives. The Washington Post revealed secret CIA prisons; USA Today alerted us to the National Security Agency's policy of secretly collecting phone records of everyday citizens; The New York Times' Nicholas Kristof almost single-handedly unveiled the genocide in Darfur, Sudan. At home, The Wisconsin State Journal examined the quality of Madison drinking water and prompted investigations across the nation that keeps on notice that someone is watching.

Is this cockroach behavior?

"When things are so good, why is our story so bad?" asked Shawn McIntosh, deputy managing editor of The Atlanta Journal- Constitution. We were at a recent seminar on The Future of News at The Poynter Institute, a journalism think-tank in St. Petersburg, Florida. "How are we going to correct the record and tell the truth about what we know best?" she challenged the group.

Implicit in McIntosh's comments is that by failing to tell the truth about cherished national values, such as great story telling and excellent journalism, we make it possible for the new world to invest only in technology.

"The technology provides the tools to deliver excellent journalism, but the technology itself is not excellent journalism," Bill Marimow, vice president for news at National Public Radio, warned recently.

The distortion of the innovation and forward movement of the nation's newsrooms by people who work in those places is more than a bit troubling. Why can't we get the story straight?

There is not one easy answer, and I can only give you one editor's observations.

We are in the midst of a cultural transition that is shattering the media landscape as it divides two of the most privileged generations: the Baby Boomers and their children.

The older generation prefers the slow and thoughtful media of the newspaper that generates a community conversation. The younger generation demands the fast, free media of the Web that resolves stress and chaos in their lives.

Playing out here is an age-old conflict between the values of community versus the individual. Journalists will almost always choose to write about a conflict unless given a better angle. To balance this story we need to invite some new voices from people who can imagine a solution. We turn once again to you, the smart people of Madison.

I open up my inbox to you at efoley@madison.com. Tell me how the world of getting information is going to work five years from now. Will you be reading a newspaper? Will you receive a tailored news report via the Internet? How will we pay people who do watchdog journalism and dig up news-you- can-use if no one pays for Internet information? What might a new technology that bridges the two generations' wants and needs look like and who will develop it?

I'll share your solutions in the coming weeks. Perhaps some of my colleagues might eavesdrop before they write their next obituary for the news biz.